As they were washed away, Ash just managed to catch hold of a jutting piece of rock with his fingertips and for a moment the water swirling around the cave lifted him high enough to get a better grip before submerging him entirely. He clung on underwater, the enormous wave swirling around him, threatening to break his grip before finally receding.
Underwater, the light from the large torch, which was still on full-beam, as it sank, illuminated the water as it was drawn towards the cave’s once-gaping entrance. Ash thought he could see the dark shape of Delphine struggling to reach the surface and, further ahead, a smudge that could only have been Louis fighting against the current that was drawing him out of the cave.
The only chance he had of reaching them was to swim underwater, but first he needed to fill his lungs with air. He kicked up to get his head above the surface and catch a breath. It was difficult. The turbulent water threw his body around as if he were in a giant washing machine, but as soon as he’d taken the biggest breath of his life, he dived back under, pushing himself off the rock face below the water to give himself impetus, using his arms and hands to take him down into the murky depths, the faithful Maglite still giving off its glow.
He could feel the current sucking him out of the cave as it retracted, and he went with it, using the undercurrent to drag him along. He had to reach Delphine and Louis.
The investigator was well aware he was no great swimmer, but his instinct for survival took over.
Suddenly the glow from the torch dimmed, replaced by a different kind of light. When Ash surfaced again, there were rather than rock, clouds above him, but far to the east, allowing the pure bright moon dominance over the night sky. And although the savage winds were stormy and incoming waves were silver-topped, there was no rain. He was surprised to see most of the rocks on the shoreline were above water. He realized the route into the sea cave was much deeper than the shore on either side of it, which explained the ferocity and volume of the tidal waves, for they had unimpeded access.
Treading water in the broad trench as its current drew him ever further out to sea, Ash looked around for Delphine and Louis. There was no sign of them, so he dived again, salt water stinging his eyes and the moon’s bright reflected rays soon lost in the gloom.
When he resurfaced, he caught a glimpse of Delphine only a few yards away. Thank God! He went under once more and swam to her, placing his hands under her arm and pushing upwards. Within seconds, they were face to face, trying to tread water.
She gasped in relief and briefly enfolded him in her arms. Not far away there was a rocky boulder jutting above the surface and he pointed towards it in an exaggerated motion. She nodded furiously, and they swam to it together. He pressed his cheek to hers as they clung there.
‘Did you see the prince anywhere?’ he shouted, and even in her frightened state she looked baffled.
‘Louis,’ he cried quickly, hoping she’d think she’d misheard him in the howling wind. ‘Where did you see Louis last?’
‘I . . .’ She spluttered water, hanging on to the rock for dear life. ‘I don’t . . . I don’t know. He . . . was swept away from me!’
Ash remembered Jonas McKewin warning him how dangerous the currents on this part of the coast were.
Then: ‘David! Look! Over there!’
She was pointing at a spot thirty yards or so away. If the moon hadn’t been so bright, she would never have seen the small white head that suddenly appeared on the rolling surface of the sea. Ash spied it too, and now had to resist the surge that was trying to suck them out to sea. Could the tide have turned so quickly and so dramatically? Louis would soon be dragged beyond reach.
‘Delphine, I’m going after him.’ His mouth was close to her cheek. ‘I want you to stay here.’
She caught at his arm.
‘You’ll be safe if you can just hang on here. I think the wind’s dying down. Look at the waves – they’re much smaller.’
As the previous incoming surge retreated from the shore, they were both lifted higher in the water and were able to grab a better purchase near the top of the sea-washed boulder.
Delphine clutched at him again. In the moonlight he could see not only her concern, but her exhaustion too. If anything, she looked even more beautiful. In the silvery light her skin looked so pale, like smooth porcelain against the raven-black hair that framed her face with limp curls, her eyes wide, begging him without words to stay safe.
Christ, Ash wanted to sit there until help came or the tide had gone out completely. But he couldn’t let the young prince, who’d never lived a normal life, simply drown.
‘Promise me you’ll stay here,’ he urged. Her eyes opened once more and he could see resignation in them.
Without another word, Ash pushed himself from the rock and started swimming urgently to the last place they’d seen Louis. The current was now helping him, and for every wave that tried to send him back, the tide took him out further and more swiftly.
He thought he glimpsed something just above the surface a few yards ahead but he couldn’t be sure, it disappeared so rapidly. He could do nothing for Juliet now, but maybe he could save Louis; maybe they needn’t both die.
Then, in the bright moonlight, he just caught sight of Louis sinking below him. As he dived down everything went black and he felt himself being sucked deeper by the current. The prince was gone, completely out of sight. Yet another memory flashed before him of his morning walk along the shoreline: McKewin had said there was a deep sea-shelf about thirty yards out with dangerous rip tides. He felt an urge to swim for the surface again, but he suddenly realized something very odd was happening below him.
Although the deep water was so dark, something lighter was slowly filtering through. As it grew stronger he saw the silhouetted shape of Louis, his arms straight out to each side of him, legs together, head unmoving. It was as though the young prince were enacting a kind of crucifixion.
A subtle blue light, gradually gaining in strength, shone behind Louis. It radiated through his naked flesh, revealing his bones and organs like an X-ray. The sarong was gone now, and Ash noticed that the makeshift bandage he’d made for the young man’s slashed leg had worked itself loose and was floating away. A small trickle of darkness curled from the wound like a thin stream of smoke that was soon absorbed into the seawater. Then, as he watched, the bleeding stopped altogether. Steadily this wondrous, somehow gloriously peaceful blueness spread under the water like a soft, gently billowing cloud, its edges undefined, vignetted. Even the strong rip currents did not move it. It floated below like a sublime ethereal haze and Louis was sinking towards it. Ash remembered the blue in Louis’ eyes earlier, and the faint azure light over the prince’s cowering figure when Ash had first encountered him in his room.
This was the same pure shade.
As the prince slowly sank, he resembled an exotic creature from the deepest oceans, whose diaphanous nature allows them to withstand pressures of many tons, their flimsy bell-like shapes roaming the deepest oceans like divine aliens.
Ash at first thought that Louis must be dead, for he could clearly see his lungs were flat against his ribcage. Then the prince slowly and gracefully revolved as he floated downwards. And Ash, whose lungs were at their limit, saw Louis smile up at him, his face wondrously beautiful in its peacefulness.
Ash sensed Louis’ smile was a message – a sign that all was well, that his death was but a return to one whose love had brought him to her, to be now cherished. His mother was reclaiming him and would love him in some other, sublime place.
Ash watched in awe as Louis sank into the most beautiful blueness he’d ever seen. The incorporeal soft-hued mist slowly enfolded him, enveloping Louis, and he was soon lost from view in the azure haze.
The investigator was mesmerized, and knew he had witnessed something truly glorious. Nevertheless, his lungs protested for lack of air. Although he was deep below the surface, he swam up unhurriedly, without panic, for he knew he was protected. As he did so
the brightness below faded. He looked back over his shoulder, just before he surfaced. There was nothing below him now but a black void.
Mother and son had vanished.
99
Now that was utterly peculiar.
Way out to sea, Lord Lucan saw three small lights headed straight for Comraich. What in the blazes? he asked himself. Can’t be bloody aeroplanes, not that close together.
He was distracted by shouts and the nearby clattering of a helicopter’s rotors landside, where the castle’s helipads were. He looked over and saw the larger of Comraich’s two helicopters readying itself for take-off. All was perfectly clear in the moonlight. Lucan tutted at the behaviour of the so-called VIPs, who were physically pushing and shoving, fighting to get aboard the flying machine. He heard their shouts of rage and indignation and the crackling of the fire inside the castle, even over the sirens – which now seemed quite near, perhaps from just inside the compound’s gates. One man ran shrieking out of the small side door, his back, arms and hair alight, but no one helped him.
Lucan turned back to the helicopter. It was actually rising into the air with one of the dinner-jacketed VIPs hanging half-in, half-out, with someone in the passenger seat next to the pilot – it looked like that oily little fellow Maseby – doing his best to dislodge the poor panicky bastard, who fought like a demon.
He had no chance. The chopper was all over the shop with displaced passengers upsetting the machine’s balance. It must have been at least a hundred feet in the air before the unfortunate chap fell with an ear-piercing scream, which lasted about three seconds before his body splattered against the ground.
All rather exciting, thought Lucan.
Then came the biggest thrill of all.
The fancy helicopter, three hundred feet in the air, had just turned to head out to sea when it exploded spectacularly in a great bloom of yellow and red fire edged in black. Burning wreckage tumbled from the sky, together with flaming human body parts.
Lucan wondered if he’d be deafened for life from the thundering boom of the explosion as he went over to the walkway’s crenellated wall to watch the helicopter’s wreckage drop to the rocky shoreline below. Burning sections were scattered all over the rocks.
It was then that something further along the shore caught his attention – a small light flashing on and off.
Cedric Twigg sniggered, a hand to his mouth, though no one would have heard him from where he hid just inside the woodland watching his handiwork. His plan had worked perfectly.
Comraich Castle was blazing brightly, the flames encouraged by the rough winds blowing up from the sea. The sounds of walls crumbling and floors falling in were music to his ears. Those who’d survived the explosions and the inferno now stood like zombies before the conflagration, frightened for their lives.
The explosion of the helicopter had been the tour de force, such a wondrous demonstration of one man’s mastery of his art – a magnificent firework display in the night sky, outdazzling the moon and stars.
But now he could hear sirens approaching. Police? The sounds were close enough to be inside the compound. He sniggered again as he collected his detonators and other items, throwing them all into his large holdall.
Oh, one more thing. He’d almost forgotten after the wonderful pyrotechnics. The Gazelle helicopter was still to blow. Might as well wait to finish off the show.
100
Ash dragged in air and seawater at the same time.
Spluttering, and choking, he tried to keep his head above the choppy surface, treading water and trying to swim breast-stroke at the same time. He was desperately tired now. The amazing uplift in his heart and his spirit from what he’d witnessed in the depths beyond the shelf was wearing off. Struggling against the ferocious current that tried to carry him further out to sea, he prayed for another miracle to help him reach Delphine and safety.
With his strength ebbing away, a miracle of sorts did occur: his hands knocked against something hard, not rock but . . . metal. Ash kicked wildly against the undertow and his hands scrabbled frantically to gain a purchase on what proved to be a metal tube just beneath the surface.
In an instant, he knew what it was, for he’d observed it earlier. The long pipe that led down from the castle to the shoreline and then on out to sea – the sewage outlet.
Ash could have cried with relief as he mustered all his reserves of energy to pull himself along the pipe, fearful of losing his grip and afraid his hands and arms would become too exhausted with the effort.
He continued, foot by foot, each time he went under forcing himself up again, using the tops of the wind-blown waves to propel him along. He knew he could reach the higher part of the rock-strewn beach and might be able to stand or drag his feet along soon. With luck, the tide would have receded sufficiently by then to enable Delphine to walk to the shore.
But the sea was not yet done with him. It drew him back, and for a moment he considered how easy it would be to allow his body to float away, slowly to drift into the depths as Louis had done. As Juliet had been forced to do. The temptation almost overwhelmed him: to be somewhere peaceful, away from this world and its troubles, to be among friends again, to see Grace maybe waiting for him . . . But no! The vision of Grace succumbed to that of Delphine, and that vision gave him the strength he needed to fight onwards, onwards, nearly there . . . onwards . . . onwards . . .
His mind was beginning to wander due to utter, helpless, hopeless fatigue. It was undermining him – not just the muscles in his arms and legs but also his consciousness. Thoughts that should have sustained were faltering. Strength was finally seeping from flesh and sinew. His mind was closing down with his muscles. He felt himself slip below the water, but it didn’t matter because his lungs were becoming too relaxed to take another breath. The water was like a soft bed. If he could just lie here for a while—
Something, someone, grabbed his hair and pulled roughly. The pain was excruciating, but only for a moment, for another hand reached under his armpit and tugged hard. He was floating now in the right direction and his knees scraped soft shingle and hard rock on the shoreline.
Ash reared up and drew in so much air his lungs might have exploded.
Other arms lifted him and, half-delirious with weakness, he saw faces, familiar faces . . .
Ash lay against a smooth shore boulder, his boots in a shallow rock pool. His vision was still blurred and he had to blink several times to clear it, unsure whether his eyes were filled with seawater or tears. Finally soft hands, kind hands, took over and wiped his eyes and then his face. He looked up to see the wind blowing Delphine’s lush black hair around her cheeks as she smiled at him. He could just about summon the energy to smile back at her, and something in their mutual gaze told him she would never go away. She kissed him and he lifted a weary hand to stroke the back of her neck beneath the thick curls.
‘David,’ she whispered, close to his ear. ‘Louis . . . ?’
‘He’s gone,’ Ash replied just as quietly. ‘But trust me, Delphine. He’s in a better place.’
When at last she pulled back he could see other figures around them.
Mercifully, the chill wind had abated somewhat, so voices did not have to be raised, although the small gathering of soaked people huddling together still felt compelled to speak loudly.
‘Sorry I nearly had to pull your hair out,’ said Gordon Dalzell, ‘but it was the only part of you I could reach. Otherwise, you’da drifted right back out again.’
‘How did you know? Where we were, I mean?’ Ash asked, the effort of forming a coherent question almost too much.
Another figure came forward, the moon behind him. ‘Well, y’can thank Dr Wyatt for that. She saved your life, as well as her own.’ The voice belonged to Graham Hamilton, Gordon’s business partner and ‘other half’.
Delphine held up the slim Maglite. ‘When you left me on the rock I thought I’d lost both you and Louis.’ She bowed her head, but Ash knew it wasn’t the tim
e to tell her of the awesome miracle he’d witnessed under the sea. ‘I couldn’t see either of you and I wanted to swim after you.’
‘I’m glad you didn’t.’ Ash would never have been able to stand losing someone he loved so very much. Not again.
‘Then I remembered the torch: it was still in my little bag.’ She held the thin Maglite aloft. ‘First I used it to sweep the sea in the hope I’d find you. But you were both gone.’
He saw a tear glistening on her cheek.
‘Then she used her brains,’ interrupted Graham, as if afraid that the scene might turn mawkish. The wind blew again, so Ash had to strain to hear the words. ‘Dr Wyatt shone the torch up to the top of the cliff – not at the castle, obviously.’ Graham’s grin was broad in the moonlight.
‘Will y’nae stretch it out too long,’ Gordon reprimanded his partner good-humouredly. ‘We’re getting awful cold down here.’
‘Well, she not only tried to signal the people up top, but she used Morse code. How’s that for good thinkin’?’
‘SOS is so simple,’ said Delphine. ‘My father showed me how when I was seven years old.’ She was wearing Gordon’s jacket, which was much too big for her.
Graham continued. ‘An old boy, one of the guests I’d seen around for years, was on the castle walk, and I went up t’see if he needed any help. Instead, he just pointed down to where this little light was shining an SOS in Morse code. At first, I thought it might’ve been a survivor of the helicopter explosion.’ He noted the perplexed expression on Ash’s face. ‘There’s a lot to explain, but dinnae ask me now. Anyway, I saw Gordon and we got Mr McKewin to bring us down.’
Ash saw the head ranger standing on the fringe of the gathering.
‘So, with some difficulty . . .’ Gordon glared at Graham. ‘We managed to make it down here to the shore. We were lucky the tide was on the way out or we’d never have made it to Dr Wyatt to get her back here.’